Many departments at UCD conduct behavioral experiments with humans. Since there is no campus-wide coordinator to facilitate cooperation between departments, and logistical difficulties (eg, ownership, responsibility, design approval, etc.) make it difficult to create a page, we are using this wiki to do so. Feel free to add to and/or edit this page.

Participating in some of these studies is a great way to earn some extra cash as an undergraduate. Pay attention to bulletin boards seeking volunteers and email for more info. Sometimes it's something as simple as hanging out and playing board games for an hour to earn $25. It's fun, it helps out researchers and it can earn you some extra dough.

Who cares about this page?

Experimenters in various departments may want to know what others are doing, what software they are using and/or want to give/receive help in carrying out experiments. They should be able to find each other here.

Students may want to participate in experiments in various departments. They should be able to learn more on this page.

If you want to know more about experimental economics, check out this page at Vernon Smith's Interdisciplinary Center for Economic Science. Smith won the Nobel Prize for his experimental work in 2002.

Departments and Groups Doing Experiments

Economics sometimes recruiting subjects for market games. Register at http://econlab.ucdavis.edu and then respond to an invitation for scheduled sessions. Compensation is on average $15 for an hour session, and is at least $5 simply for showing up to the experiment. Contact: Burkhard C. Schipper

zTree PC-software for experiments (free with signed use agreement). zTree has a helpful mailing list, too.

Gameweb, a web-based experimental game platform initially developed by Richard McElreath and funded by the NSF. The platform is built on PHP/MySQL and runs on an Apache server. It is currently in the process of being open-sourced as a SourceForge project.

Institutional Review Board (IRB) Approval

To protect subjects, all UCD-based principal investigators are required to get IRB approval before beginning experiments (or any form of research involving human subjects). The IRB process was developed to prevent unethical research or research that could expose its human subjects to unreasonable risk. This concern was spurred by historical precedent. However, the experiments discussed in this DavisWiki article are distinguished from the majority of IRB cases because they are behavioral experiments and completely non-invasive. The IRB process seems overly-complicated for simple behavioral experiments, but it's required. Nobody disagrees with the need for an IRB-like process overseeing all human experiments, but many people hope a separate institution could govern non-medical research in the social and behavioral sciences. Luckily, non-invasive experiments can often be reviewed and approved using the "expedited" form in about a week.

Facilities @ UCD

93 Hutchison can be reserved by UCD experimenters for free. Contact lab-reserve@ucdavis.edu. They have zTree installed on the 30 computers there.

Other Resources

Visiting Graduate Student Workshop in Experimental Economics at ICES is an excellent way to learn about different experimental methods & theory and meet people who do lots of experiments & students interested in them. The workshop takes place in mid-July and is free. You will earn enough money from participating to pay most or all of your travel, food and lodging expenses. Applications are due March 15.